Tuna-1 Natural Gas Discovery for Turkey

Mavi Boncuk |

A gas discovery of the scale of the Tuna-1 find in the Black Sea, if developed, would be transformational for Turkey, given its overwhelming reliance on imports and crippling energy import bill.  Turkey is chiefly reliant on piped gas from Russia, Azerbaijan and Iran but the share of liquefied natural gas imports has also continued to grow.

Thomas Purdie, an analyst on Wood Mackenzie’s upstream research team, said: “Even if the official 320 billion cubic metre figure given by President Tayyip Erdogan when he announced the discovery is treated as an estimate of gas in place, this is Turkey’s biggest-ever find – by a wide margin – and one of the largest global discoveries of 2020.

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Turkey’s first oil and gas drilling vessel, Fatih, set sail from northern Turkey’s Trabzon on June 25 for its long-awaited drilling mission in the Black Sea following the completion of installation projects. The Fatih drillship joined the Turkish Petroleum Corporation (TPAO) inventory in 2017, during Minister Albayrak’s term as an energy minister.

Fatih was set to start its first drilling activities in the Black Sea in the Tuna-1 zone in mid-July, Dönmez announced at the time.

The newly discovered natural gas was found during the ninth round of deep drilling, Dönmez said Friday, during a live broadcast from the drillship Fatih.

“The Tuna-1 well is located on the seabed at a depth of 2,100 meters (6,890 feet). We drilled 1,400 meters further, where we hit the gas reserve. We will drill a further 1,000 meters where two more layers are expected,” Dönmez said, highlighting that the quality of discovered gas is also high, “which will possibly affect (decrease) potential cost of extraction.”